Norwegian Wood

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Teenage feelings of guilt, love, loss, depression, and fears of growing up are treated with utmost respect in Norwegian Wood, an adaptation of the best selling novel by Haruki Murakami. Boasting beautiful cinematography and earnest performances, this downer of a drama's languid pacing and determination to include throwaway scenes stops it from being the film it could have been.

Watanabe (Matsuyama), Naoko (Kikuchi) and Kizuki (Kengo Kora) are three best friends growing up in Tokyo in 1967. Of the three, Watanabe would be the third wheel, as Naoko and Kizuki are closer than close, like two parts of the one person. When Kizuki commits suicide (the why is never explained), Kaoko descends into depression and takes time out at a retreat outside Kyoko. Watanabe throws himself into books in college, visiting Naoko occasionally where a tentative love begins to blossom. When not at the retreat, Watanabe spends time with Midori (Mizuhara), an odd girl who seems to be driven purely by sexual fulfilment.

The downbeat tone in which writer-director Anh Hung Tran tells the story allows some wiggle room to get inside the heads of his protagonists; Watanabe might narrate the film but because he's stingy with details the director fills the information void with longing glances and introspective conversations. Naoko and Watanabe are two people who have no secrets from each other and it's odd to be in their presence as they conduct their very open and honest talks where they lay bare their fragile souls (It's hard to describe their closeness: when Watanabe is asked why he loves Naoko, his only reply is "it's complicated"). Norwegian Wood is a beautiful looking film; once Anh Hung Tran moves the action from the city to the countryside it allows him to point the camera at beautiful meadows in the morning sun, which he gets his two pretty leads to stroll through. The characters too can say the most bizarre things at the oddest moments: when Midori's father dies, the first thing she does is ring Watanabe and ask him to take her to a porn film. It's all very pretty and surreal.

But where Norwegian Wood can be tender and loving and sexy, at 133 minutes there are more than a few superfluous scenes to be found. Some sequences at the retreat can get monotonous and repetitive and it's hard to see why Watanabe's burgeoning relationship with Midori is essential to the story.